Category Archives: Book Reviews

[The general] ran into misunderstandings between military and civilian leadership over things as simple as terminology…. “What it really showed was because different cultures — the military, civilian, whatnot — all have their own lexicon, you can be having a conversation … Continue reading →

On his site China Rhyming, Paul French has posted a review of Howard French’s Disappearing Shanghai. “…a photographic exploration of life in the old and rapidly disappearing quarters of Shanghai, with accompanying poems and essays by the author of fiction … Continue reading →

From Marg at Historical Tapestry: “Today, I am thrilled to introduce James Lande from Old China Books to give us a fantastically comprehensive list of suggested reading about China!” Historical Tapestry invited James to guest post with a discussion of historical novels … Continue reading →

Siobhan Pratt’s Precious Moon tells of Katie, a wandering English girl lost in the Argentine highlands, who steps away from a bus crashed high in the mountains into another world. Alex, an English doctor working at a local clinic, comes … Continue reading →

Kenneth Weene’s Tales from the Dew Drop Inne tells of the Runyonesque regulars at an Albuquerque, New Mexico, bar called the Dew Drop Inne, ala Cheers, but more gritty than glitzy. The Dew Drop Inne is more “an island of floating debris” where people … Continue reading →

(This is the original of the article mentioned in an earlier old China Books post Novels About China: Guest Post at Historical Tapestry.) Historical Tapestry has invited me to guest post with a discussion of historical novels set in China. This in … Continue reading →

By JJ Chats – See all my reviews This review is from: Yang Shen: The God from the West, Book 1 – Landfall, 1860 (Paperback) The story begins with the hero Fletcher Thorson Wood making his way to Shanghai … Continue reading →

By David Format:Paperback James Lande has told a whale of a yarn here. His hero steps ashore in 1860 Shanghai, vibrating with trade between what we now call the Western Powers and China,a China split by one of the biggest … Continue reading →

By RK Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase Yang Shen: The God from the West puts the reader directly into the chaos of mid-19th. century Shanghai. As a center for international trade, the Shanghai of 1860 was a turbulent mix of Chinese and … Continue reading →

By rcnewt Format:Paperback Having recently finished the unabridged version of Les Miserables, when I began Yang Shen I immediately noticed a similarity between the technique of Mr Lande with the work of Victor Hugo. Both authors have interspersed chapters containing … Continue reading →